


Feather-light

by Shamelessly_Radiant



Category: Elisabeth - Levay/Kunze
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-08
Updated: 2018-12-08
Packaged: 2019-09-14 04:04:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16905768
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shamelessly_Radiant/pseuds/Shamelessly_Radiant
Summary: As the last drop of ink landed on the paper, Elisabeth set aside her feather, leaned back in her chair and simply waited.(Elisabeth writes her last will. Der Tod takes this as an invitation, of course.)





	Feather-light

**Author's Note:**

> I saw Empress Elisabeth's last will at Schloss Shönbrunn in Vienna, but cannot for the life of me remember or find when she signed it. Thus, this time table is purely fictional. I still need to finish 'The Reluctant Empress', maybe I'll change this fic after I do.

As the last drop of ink landed on the paper, Elisabeth set aside her feather, leaned back in her chair and simply waited.

One, two seconds later, there it was—the subtle gush of air, as if the current had changed upon perceiving a new presence materialising in her room, and then the room getting almost imperceptibly cooler, the sounds around her getting hushed and still, and lastly, the hands settling lightly on her shoulders as she shivered.

“Were you waiting for me?” He murmurs, his thumbs softly smoothing soothing circles into her skin, massaging her sore muscles.

“No,” she whispers, even as she leans into his touch, careful not to disturb the silence, “but I’d knew you’d come.”

“You wrote your will, Elisabeth. Should I not have taken that as an invitation?”

His question sounds careless enough, but the way his fingers momentarily dig into her shoulders make her pause. She has missed him, these last few months. His visits, since her son died, have ceased. She has barely sensed him around. She does not want to admit that she’d written with the hope he’d come, but she also does not want to spit out venom that will make him leave her again. She has tied herself to her ship’s deck in storms, she has weathered and is worn, and old, and tired—

And he rejected her. And now he is here. And she finds she does not understand.

So she doesn’t say a word, and he seems to not need any answer either, to press closer to her from behind, until her head is resting on his chest and stomach, and he seems to not need any answer to have his hands move, one hand tracing the fragile skin of her throat, thumb digging into her hair as he moves it upwards, the other hand moving slowly but surely downwards, stroking her collarbone and going further down still, pausing for a moment at her neckline, before in one movement dipping down and inside, settling firmly but gently on the smooth curve of her breast. At the same time his fingers stroke her lips softly and she is lost.

The fine hairs on his head stroke her cheek as he bends to press his lips to the soft column of her throat, kissing up until he reaches her cheekbone. Elisabeth tenses momentarily, unsure if she should push him away, unsure if she should let him and just have it be _over with_. But then his fingers find her nipple, rolling it softly and she sighs, closes her eyes and surrenders.

But his mouth, though it edges hers, never touches, never gives her the kiss that would seal her fate. Instead, he lifts her up from her chair like she were a doll, one arm completely circles her waist, presses her completely against him, and his hands find the row of tiny buttons sewn on the back of her dress, and they do not fumble, and her dress falls quickly around her, too quickly, rousing her from her trance momentarily.

“No,” she breathes out, pressing her hand to his chest. His eyes are dark and hooded when he looks at her, and he seems at once, everywhere around her, and Elisabeth seems to be held by the air and by his wings and by his hands. She presses her hand to his chest, and he waits, and she pulls back when she realises she is unable to feel his heart beat— _because he is Death, and how could she have forgotten._

Yet, he takes her pulling back her hand as permission, and his hand settles on her ribs. “Thin,” he murmurs, so quietly she is not sure he spoke at all, before edging down, _down._

He lifts her into his arms, cradling her close against a broad chest, as he did once before, years ago, when she was fifteen, and God, had she ever been that young? She hadn’t met Franz-Joseph back then, had wanted to be so much like her father, and she had thought that this… _presence_ before her, that she then mistakenly had called a man, had meant love.

The way his lips quirk up makes her think he is remembering too, and she almost thinks to ask him, but then he lays her down and she doesn’t break the silence.

He kneels next to her, and his hand settles on the curve of her ankle, and there he pauses, and she thinks if he’d need to breathe, he’d be holding it now. She is holding hers. The look in his eyes could be a question, or an answer— she has never given him this much, and now he is waiting, but she does not know what he is waiting for.

After a breath of just looking into each other’s eyes, his hand starts to move up, slowly but surely. His lips find her throat, shoulder, collarbone, chest, but never her lips. And his hand moves up, up, over her legs, and the bend of her knees, and then settles on the outside of her thigh, and continues moving.

And as Death’s hands and lips move over her skin, Elisabeth smiles.


End file.
